


Call forth Eurydice

by miabicicletta



Category: Sherlock (TV), The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
Genre: (Obviously), Alternate Universe - Dystopia, Crossover, F/M, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, It's An Angry Feminist Love Story!, Not Canon Compliant, Prostitution, Suicidal Thoughts, The author apologizes for nothing (haha she means everything)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-08
Updated: 2017-01-08
Packaged: 2018-09-15 18:17:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,510
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9249896
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/miabicicletta/pseuds/miabicicletta
Summary: Once upon a time, began the tales of princesses and knights, of witches and demons. Brave hope in lost quests, and true love conquers all. What foolishness they professed. What ignorance they clung to.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [jaxington](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jaxington/gifts).



> A little fic, I said. A few thousand words. An idea. Okay, so, like 5-6k. Or 8. I'll be done in under 10k. 11. OKAY I'M REALLY DONE at 12,000 words. Sigh. So obviously this poured out of me over the last few weeks. I have a lot of feelings about things right now. I mean, I always I have a lot of feelings, but I do now, too. 
> 
> Huge, huge thanks to [geekmama](http://archiveofourown.org/users/geekmama/pseuds/geekmama), [AsteraceaeBlue](http://archiveofourown.org/users/AsteraceaeBlue/pseuds/AsteraceaeBlue), and [vermofftiss](https://vermofftiss.tumblr.com/) for all looking this over at one point or another. You're all amazing rockstar geniuses and I love you. Any additional mistakes made in the tweaking of this are my own. 
> 
> For [jaxington](http://archiveofourown.org/users/jaxington/pseuds/jaxington), who is really nothing but an enabler, the cad.

* * *

  

“We may call Eurydice forth from the world of the dead, but we cannot make her answer; and when we turn to look at her we glimpse her only for a moment, before she slips from our grasp and flees.”

—Margaret Atwood, **_The Handmaid’s Tale_ **

 

* * *

 

_Once upon a time._

 

Stories used to begin that way. That was before. Before they took everything back, stories included. Before they took her job and her friends. Before they stole her name, saying she no longer required one. Before they relieved her of the freedoms of youth. Not necessary, now. Now, they promised, she was reformed. Protected. She was _saved_ . A picture of all of innocence, a paragon of virtue. _Angelic_. As if they had held her to a flame, distilling out the impurities. Refined her down to the most basic parts. Burning out the hope. The heart.

 

At the reeducation centre, the others often whispered into the darkness between beds, repeating sounds that used to be their own. _Sally. Soo Lin. Meena._

 

She does not speak her name. It is hers. It belongs to no one else. And even if the woman it belonged to is gone, dead in a sense, something of her lives. It is too much to bear dwelling on, even in the dark, when grief can be hidden.

 

She thinks of the stories they used to tell. The stories she grew up hearing.

 

 _Once upon a time_ , began the tales of princesses and knights, of witches and demons. Brave hope in lost quests, and true love conquers all. What foolishness they professed. What ignorance they clung to.

 

But she never revisits the meaning of these stories for long. Here at the end, she never strays too far from how the stories began. It becomes her false prayer. A joke, almost.

 

And yet still, it lingers on her tongue, there in the dark, close, but distant, like morning growing to fade:

 

_Once..._

 

. . .

 

**Month one**

 

The car stops before a house. The house is nice. A nice house, in a nice neighborhood. There’s a nice big park at the end of the block, and a nice high street nearby, full of nice little shops and grocers and bakers. There are nice schools and nice community events. These nice things are all protected by nice high walls, strong men in dark uniforms—so brave, so brave—who stand at corners and at checkpoints, and carry their guns like justice.

 

The driver opens the door. He’s tall and scrawny. His eyes run over the red of her dress, the red headwrap, her clasped and shaking hands. Maybe, if she had offered, he’d have taken her elsewhere. It wouldn’t matter where. Anyplace. Any place at all.

 

“Oi,” he smiles. “Chin up, angel.”

 

She dismisses the thought outright. He has marginally more agency than she does.   

 

A short man with gray-blond hair stands at the door. Below the red cloth of her headscarf, she nods her head in deference. His wife is also blonde, with clear blue eyes that crinkle when she smiles. Perhaps she is a nice person.

 

How nice everything is, how lovely.

 

It’s almost real.

 

. . .

 

The Captain and his wife are the center of the house on Baker Street, which is large, old, and in places, rather strangely decorated. She realizes the first day that it is actually not a single house, but two adjoining properties transformed into one. She wonders what other lives the house may have had. Who else it had known.

 

The first day she is welcomed through the main door, shining brass address reading _223._ From then on, she is told by the housekeeper, she is always to use the secondary entrance next door, _221_. Rules. Hierarchies, even now. Especially now. The Captain’s wife looks on as she is escorted in, surrounded by a flock of clucking women who survey her with dispassionate interest, as if they were shopping, or commenting on a pet.

 

“Have they told you much?”

 

“No, just that she’s educated, and Perfect Purity. We’re very grateful.”

 

“I’m sure it’s nothing more than you deserve,” says one woman, with red hair and a long nose. “Very thin though. She may not last.”

 

“There are always others. Oh, have you heard about Mrs. Turner?”

 

The house is run by a gray woman, a Martha, called Hudson. Hudson does not speak much, other than to give instructions, or to assign household tasks. She often has the sense that Hudson would like to say more, but each time the woman’s mouth opens, a desire for communication caught on her tongue, she snaps her lips closed, and says nothing at all.

 

Her prison, much as hell, has several levels:

 

The ground-floor rooms wrap around the stairs leading up. A foyer leads to a front parlor, for entertaining, with large windows and an heavy mantled fireplace. There is also a long, shadowy dining room that screams old opulence and is bedecked with ugly, ornate Victoriana. To the back of the house, through a hallway, are the pantry and kitchen, part of her domain. Her days will be spent here, in service, tending the home, running minor errands, Hudson explains. _For now,_  is implied. In spring there will be gardening in the small plot out back.

 

But that is the future. Months from now. Months and months and months...

 

A door on the first floor landing connects the living quarters of the Captain and his wife—bedchamber, washing rooms, sitting rooms—to another that serves as a library and the Captain’s study. Closed doors of delicate glass lead...elsewhere. It is not explained. The second floor, above the rest of the house, is a single, white room. A window and a small skylight filter in clean winter light through the glass.

 

Her room is white. White walls and white sheets and white for purity.

 

“You’re so lucky,” the women at the reeducation centre had told her. “You’ll go to one of the high-ups.” The women had been right about that. She wonders what else they are right about.

 

There are no dressings on the windows. No blinds with string. No curtains with sashes. No ceiling fixtures. No obvious temptations.

 

How fortunate she knows so much about the many frailties of the human body, then.

 

She closes her eyes.

 

How fortunate she knows so much about death.

 

. . .

 

She has no idea what role or duties the Captain performs outside of his home, but she’s seen clips of him with powerful men.

 

“That’s them. The apex predator, Magnussen,” Sally once told her, at the centre. One of the Sisters had left a video tablet in an adjoining room. They stood, pressed against a glass partition, watching the blue-light through the window. It was a minor act of rebellion to simply stand and watch. They were not supposed to have access to videos, newspapers, the internet. They were not supposed to have information. She drank in the footage, an unexpected thrill bolting through her.

 

On the screen was the thin face of a tall, bespectacled man. She stared at it, without fully understanding why she was riveted to look at hin. Too old to be considered _handsome_ , he was nonetheless an arresting figure, certainly. His severe face. His cold blue eyes. The oddly avuncular and out-of-place glasses. Apart from the Guardian soldiers who’d taken her in, the last man she had seen and touched was a bedridden sixty-four-year old former chemist with ischaemic heart disease. Her father.

 

_I’m sorry, love. I’m so sorry._

 

Perhaps it was not the maleness of the figure. Perhaps it the screen itself, once such a common thing, which she could choose to power on and _learn_ from, at any time she pleased. Ubiquitous. It had been almost three years since she’d last seen one, the night they rounded her from Barts.

 

Her life, such that it was, is little more than collection of lasts.

 

 _Untrue_ , a voice whispered _. Soon you’ll have a first._ Acute nausea followed by laryngeal spasms.

 

The image shifted, playing on. Another figure came into view beside the cold glasses man. He was also tall, and stiff, and severe, but somewhat younger. He wore a pocket watch and held an umbrella in one hand.

 

“He’s the one,” Sally whispered. “The one in charge.”

 

“In charge?” she asked, swallowing.  

 

“Of our placements,” Sally said. “Of what happens to us next.”

 

Trailing behind both men was the Captain.

 

. . .

 

Later, after Sally had gone, when her placement came through, the Sister who delivered it cooed with pride.

 

“So proud! Such an accomplishment. You’ll be the first, you know.”

 

“The first?”

 

“They’ve never had one of you before,” the Sister continued. “It’ll be difficult for them, too, dear.”  

 

“Difficult,” she repeated, staring at at the names of her new “family.”  

 

_Captain and Mrs. John Watson, M.D._

 

“Difficult,” she says, wooden. “I'm sure.”

 

. . .

 

Her chief activities include cleaning. The wash. Errands. Helping Hudson to prepare meals.

 

Dry as dust, the days tick on. Thought experiments take shape.

 

A knife, stolen from the kitchen.

 

Glass, from the window, broken with a fist.

 

A fall down the stairs.

 

But the kitchen is closely guarded, the doors often locked.

 

The glass is shatterproof.

 

The stairs, far too short.

 

. . .

 

Whatever his role, she knows the Captain is important by the accoutrements of his office: He has a driver—the same short, portly man who collected her from the Sisters and brought her to the house on Baker Street. He has an on-site security team whose operations and equipment take up the remaining rooms beside the Captain’s study, the basement flat, and a garage behind the house. A younger man called Wiggins, tall and thin, accompanies him out of the flat. And sometimes another, Scottson, she thinks he is called, whose face she has never seen, and who is absent for long periods of time. Sometimes with the Captain. Occasionally she hears low snippets of conversation from those rooms, and from the study. She longs to linger, to hear more, desperate for anything. The tiniest piece of information. Her world is so small.

 

The Captain’s wife— _Mary,_ because of course it is—often spends her afternoons with the same coterie of pretty, shark-smiling women. Also Wives. The Wives, one of the women at the centre told her, are far worse than their husbands. Janine is the loudest. The most critical.

 

“Your girl is just _too_ thin, Mary. You really must speak to Charles. They might be young and fertile, but they _need_ to be strong.”  

 

Janine, who is married to a dull, condescending officer named Wilkes, enjoys making conversation of the body beneath the folds of her heavy red dress, and its myriad imperfections. The narrowness of her hips. The smallness of her breasts. As if she were an abstraction, an idea. An unsubtle reminder that she is no longer of personhood. She is a collection of parts with a central purpose. She, on the whole, as an individual and free-thinking human being, does not matter. It is only her body that matters. A special asset, belonging to the most important people of all. 

 

Janine does not have a Handmaid, which is probably why she is desperate to know so much about them.  

 

Mary's eyes slide to hers. A subtle glance, but one that looks like...sympathy? She turns away. She resents anything likable about these people.

 

Her gaze shifts. Mary sips her tea. “Of course,” she replies. “Of course I will.”

 

“Are you excited for your first Ceremony?” Janine asks.

 

It takes a moment to realize that Janine is speaking to _her._

 

“They’ll doll you up, all clean and bright, scrubbed fresh with actual soap. Scented! For a treat.” Janine smiles brightly. “They never complain. I mean, so I’ve heard.”

 

She doesn’t know what to say, so she smiles weakly and removes the empty teapot to refresh it. How easy it would be, she thinks, pouring the kettle water. She has momentary but vivid fantasies of strychnine. Of arsenic, and botulinum.

 

After the women have left and she is clearing their wine flutes and teacups and crumpled napkins away, Mary throws open the curtains and windows. A brisk, late-afternoon breeze fills the room, washing it of Janine’s perfume. She wonders if that is Mary’s intention.  

 

“What a beautiful day,” Mary says. “What a beautiful May day.”

 

An odd thing to say, in winter.

 

. . .

 

She lays in bed, staring at the ceiling.

 

String for the meat that she brings back from the shops.

 

Deviating from her proscribed path around Marylebone Wall into the path of a lorry.

 

A high concentration of bleach from the cleaning kit.

 

She turns over to the blank wall. The trouble is not devising effective ways to kill herself.  

 

The trouble is, in spite of everything, she really, _really_ doesn’t want to die.

 

. . .

 

The night prior to her first Ceremony, she stares at the square of sky in the ceiling, searching for a glimmer, a spark, and tries not to think, or feel, or remember.

 

The Kingdom skies are cloudy. There are no stars to be found.

 

. . .

 

Once upon a time, there was a clever little girl with a father who loved her very much. When children still went to schools, she got top marks. When girls were allowed in the universities, she studied medicine, and science. When women could become doctors, she did. Almost.

 

And then her father died.

 

These cases were always very unfortunate, it was widely felt by pale men in great buildings. They had certain titles, these men, and very fine suits. Young women could get into such trouble, they said to one another. Wouldn’t it be nice if, in the absence of parents, or when they couldn’t find a husband, when there was no one to guide them, instruct them, impose morality and virtue, and provide them _dignity_ , wouldn’t it be excellent if someone else could? They said this about a great many people they felt were “difficult.” Who were “different.” And of course, there were the troubling birthrate matters to be solved...

 

And so they created the reeducation centres, and they sent many like the clever almost-doctor away, and everything was perfectly fine after that. Well done, chaps, they said to themselves. Jolly well done.

 

. . .

 

On her white bed in her white room. The door opens. Hudson.

 

“The Captain has been called away quite suddenly,” the older woman says. “There won’t be a Ceremony this month, dear.”

 

A breath. A breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding.

 

She weeps with unabashed relief.  

 

. . .

 

**Month two**

 

In street and markets, anxious eyes find them easily. The red dresses, the red headwraps are difficult to overlook. Some look on them with pity, others with fear. Some even look on them jealousy.

 

It is strange, provoking such interest, so much attention, and still being invisible. 

 

Everywhere a Handmaid goes, crowds part for her, like water. She is charged with power unseen, like a magnet, or a saint.

 

. . .

 

It is not that she has lacked for desire, only the opportunity to act upon it.

 

There had been the boy in sixth form, a few classmates. Tom. Even when it was discouraged, though not outright banned, it was still possible, to flirt, to smile, to provoke _the idea_ of it. The suggestion—the sense of possibility—was the most alluring thing, she felt.  

 

But nothing had compared to _him_.

 

The man, the genius, the absolute _child_ of a graduate student who’d haunted her lab, at the university. He was quick, and wildly clever. Single-minded. Simultaneously amazing and infuriating.  

By then he was also one of the few who were openly outspoken about the reforms. He hadn’t been political, though, which she always found odd—the vehement ones always were. They’d lead the protests at uni, and the ones outside Whitehall. The rational thing to believe would be that this was precisely _why_ he wasn’t political. Many of them had already been rounded up by the time they had met, sent off to prisons and the labor camps on the Isle of Man. She suspects, in actuality, he just had no real interest anything beyond his “work.”

 

She’d heard he had an important family member, which is probably what kept him out of trouble as long as it did. It certainly was how he got his drugs. She remembered his lovely face, the cut on one side after she’d found him the first time. He was a little less cold to her after that. Once, after his second overdose, she could have sworn she almost saw him smile.  

 

They took him away, too.

 

Pity. He was handsome, and so breathtakingly brilliant, even if he was never exactly nice to her.

 

. . .

 

One evening after dinner, the Captain corners her in the hallway to the kitchen.

 

“When you’re finished, I’d like it if you joined me in my study.”

 

A breach of protocol. Such an interaction is Not Allowed. Neither is disobedience.

 

She looks nervously to Hudson, as if seeking approval. Or an intervention. Hudson only nods. “Um, okay,” she stutters in reply. “I mean, yes.”

 

She’s nervous when she climbs the stairs, pausing a moment at the bottom step, contemplating the shaft of light from the door. They’re not supposed to be alone with the Captains. This feels doubly illicit, since they’ve not yet had their assignment formalized with a Ceremony.

 

“I thought we might...” he starts, “play a game.”

 

“A game?”

 

“Ladies’ choice,” he says, and gestures to a pile of boxes. She recognizes them as children’s games. High hopes, he has. Is this meant to tell her something? She chooses a game she knows. She wants something she already understands the rules to. She needs to be able to concentrate on the ones that are being broken right now, this moment.

 

Tiles click on the board. Music plays low from a speaker. She doesn’t know the song. It doesn’t matter.

 

OBLIQUE, she plays. FEMUR. CORTEX.

 

The Captain is impressed. She thinks this pleases her, on some level.

 

“I’m sorry you weren’t informed sooner. About my going away.” The Captain glances up at her.

 

 _I was so fucking grateful_ , she wants to shout. _Obviously!_ “It’s fine,” she says. Her voice is small and thin. She is not used to having to use it.

 

MAYDAY he places on the board.  

 

“It won’t,” the Captain starts to say. “It won’t be like that.”

 

Her lips purse. Hands freeze, and clench. How dare he. How _dare_ he.

 

He winces, realizing the awkwardness. “I mean, how it is.”

 

Her cheeks flush with anger. With shame. With powerlessness. “I expect it won’t, for you,” she says.

 

She stands, and leaves the room without being dismissed.

 

. . .

 

Time passes so quickly, and so slowly.

 

They are making biscuits for a local school. Rich chocolate slivers spread out across the counter. Real walnuts. Butter. A dark sugar, and a light. The best of everything for the children. There are so few of them now. The rarest things, the Sisters always told them. The most precious. The most treasured. Those things, they require sacrifice.

 

She folds butter into flour. “Not like that, dear, like this.” Hudson cuts the butter into small pieces. She studies the older woman’s face. The lining at her eyes. The creases at her mouth. Sometimes she thinks Hudson actually sees a person beneath her headscarf. So few people look and _see_ her anymore.

 

The door opens and loud, chattering female voices rain in.

 

Hudson hurries so quickly to see to the visitors, to set fine things in their reach, safeguard reputations.

 

She forgets her paring knife in the sink.

 

. . .

 

The bathwater is scented, as Janine said it would be. Sweet almond. Like a confection.

 

The metal is cool against her skin. She holds it between her index fingers. The tip of the blade draws a tiny bead of blood where it pierces the thin skin. In the metal is a blurred demi-reflection, all but unrecognizable.

 

She drops the blade in the water, and wants to weep. She does not have the courage to use it.

 

. . .

 

A red dress to cover her pale, freckled skin. A red headscarf to hide her brown hair. None of these, she feels, are particularly obscene attributes. And yet it is expected of the Handmaids, to foster subservience, stem vanity, highlight their great privilege and responsibility.   

 

“Angel,” the Sisters at the reeducation centre called each of them, when they were finally “graduated” and given assignments. She was no longer Meena, and she was no longer Soo Lin.

 

_Angel, angel, angel._

 

Hudson appears at the door. Her escort. Her guard.

 

“Um, I need more time,” she protests. “I’m not ready.”

 

 _Help me,_ she pleads, silent.

 

In perhaps the first act of true kindness a person has shown to her since Sally ran away, Hudson touches her arm. “You don’t need it. It will be alright, my dear.”

 

If she fought, would they shoot her? Kill her? Send her to the camps? What would be better than this? What would be worse? By what metric could you objectively measure cruelty? Injustice?

 

The hall seems endless. The pale pink wall papering in their rooms is horrific. Like she’s been swallowed up by a great, hungry beast. It’s almost true. Her hands can’t stop shaking.

 

Hudson closes the landing door. She stares at it, frozen in the heavy, hanging silence, willing it to open. Her breath quickens. Heart pounds.

 

The Captain tries to smile. She hates him a little for it.

 

“Ah, this way.” He gestures to the door to the adjoining room. His study?  

 

“Please come in, and sit.”

 

Something is wrong. She is supposed to lie back upon a bed, received by the welcoming arms of the Captain’s wife, while he kneels between her thighs. An embrace symbolizing their union, and shared purpose.

 

His wife closes the doors. All doors. More rules are broken.

 

The Captain gestures to a strange green chair. She sits on the edge, lost. He places himself opposite her. He folds his hands before him, a quick glance to his wife, then back. “I know this seems strange but...Well, to start, it would help to know your name.”

 

She casts her eyes down. “Ofjohn Watson.”

 

The Captain shakes his head. “No, _your_ name.”

 

“I don’t understand.”

 

“Your real name,” his wife prompts. She sits on the arm of his chair.

 

“But that is the name I was given.” She looks between them. “I don’t...Why?”

 

“As a Handmaid of the Realm,” Mary Watson says, “you have no name, no autonomy, no choices. You have no rights. You enjoy no freedoms. You are brought to a home, installed for a time, and expected to bear the fruit for future generations of the Kingdom of Westminster.”

 

“Yes.”

 

Mary leans forward, her blue eyes flashing. “Don’t you just fucking _hate_ it?”  

 

Her mouth drops. She looks down, not trusting herself to hold up her demure facade. Her skin blazes. What game is this?

 

“Can we trust you?”

 

“W-what?”

 

“Can we trust you?” the Captain repeats.

 

She looks between them. “I don’t understand. Trust me with what?”

 

“Come out with it, John. She’s terrified. Besides,” Mary says, nodding, “I believe we can.”  

 

The Captain leans forward and says without preamble, “We’re Mayday. Part of the Resistance.”

 

A dull shock steals words and thought. _Mayday._ “Resistance?” she repeats.

 

“Yes.”

 

Mary pours her a drink. Hands her a tumbler. She accepts it with shaking fingers.

 

“You’re…what, agents? On the inside?” To this they nod. It dimly occurs to her that this might be a test. “How do I know you’re telling me the truth?” she asks, fearful.

 

“Well,” Mary says, droll. “For starters, you’re not about to be raped and got up the duff in the name of king, kind, and country. And you won’t ever be, as long as you are here under our ‘employ.’ When it’s just us, you can use our names.”

 

 _Mayday. Mayday._ She downs the tumbler in a go. The contents burn.

 

“And you won’t…You’re not going to...use me?” she says. Her throat aches from the alcohol, from wanting to cry. 

 

“No,” the Captain says. His eyes soften. John, she thinks. His name is John.

 

“No,” his wife swears. Mary, her name is Mary.

 

Through the cotton of shock, “Why would you do this?”

 

John folds his hands and looks her dead in the eye. “Because it’s _wrong_.”

 

A simple reason.

 

“So can we?” John asks. “Trust you?” A moot point, but a symbolic one, now. They are asking something of her. Something that flows both ways.

 

She studies their faces. They could be lying. It could all be ploy. A trap. A power game, for them. But then, what kind of game would that be, where she has nothing and they, everything? Perched on the edge of his armchair, the Captain’s wife lays a hand on her husband’s shoulder. There seems to be genuine affection—love, even—between them. And there had been the conspiratorial glances during Janine’s tirades, which felt something like an apology. The awkward way the Captain had tried to assure her the Ceremony would not be as expected. She wants to believe in them. She wants to believe there are those who would still fight back.

 

With shaking hands, she removes the knife from the lining of her red skirts. She sets it upon the table. The dull, metallic click it makes on the lacquered wooden surface is like a door being shut. Or opened.

 

“Molly,” she says, surrendering herself to the better angels of her nature. It's faith, of a sort. The irony.

 

“My name is Molly.”

 

. . .

 

Sally knew things. How, she never said, but she did, and sometimes she whispered things to Molly in the darkness between their cots. _Mayday_ , Sally said, before she got out. Molly never knew what to do with the information, but it quietly amazed her that Sally cared enough to share it.

 

She shared what little she could, wherever she got it from, before whatever else happened to her after she managed to get out. Death, or...not death. Or not. Maybe she made it. The thought is just so unlikely.

 

Molly doesn’t know which is harder to imagine: her friend who died, or the friend she couldn’t follow.

 

. . .

 

They whisper.

 

“Can you tell me? About the Resistance? What do you do?”

 

John nods. “There are a number of us. I won’t say who they all are, for your safety and theirs. But if they’re present in this study rather than just the parlors or dining room, it is a safe bet they are with us.”

 

They tell her in generalities that there are many people who oppose what has happened in the Kingdom.

 

“London,” John corrects. “It was London for two thousand years, and it still will be, after this.”

 

“We also need _your_ help,” Mary presses.

 

“What can I do?”

 

“Listen. Talk to the other Handmaids. Find out what you can. But you must be discreet. Don’t get too nosy, be conversational. We can’t afford anyone thinking you’re snooping. It’s a dangerous time.”

 

“What do you hope to do?”

 

“Ideally?” Mary replies. “Kill them all.” Despite the sweet smile on her lips, there is a conviction in her voice that makes Molly believe she’s entirely serious.

 

“Realistically,” John counters, “weaken the Commanding hierarchy. Create chaos. Confusion. Distrust. We want them unprepared when the time comes.”

 

“Time for what?”

 

“ _Phase change_ , we like to call it.”  

 

“Okay. I mean, of course I’ll help. Of course I want it to stop. What they do. What they _expect_.”

 

“If you need to talk to us, in private, do it in here.”

 

“This is the only room we’re absolutely certain sure isn’t bugged at any given time.”

 

“How do you know?”

 

“Security scans the house regularly, but they do checks in here every day. They have transmission scramblers creating digital noise in here. Makes recordings impossible.”  

 

“Ho-kay,” she says in a rush.

 

“It’s a lot to take in, we know.”

 

“I _do_ have one question.”

 

Mary nods, expectant.

 

Molly blushes. “Could I...have a book? It’s just, well, I get so _bored_.”

 

Then Mary does a thing Molly certainly hadn’t expected. She bursts into laughter.

 

“Yes. Of course you can, sweet thing. C’mon.”

 

. . .

 

In her white room, once more, the enormity of what has transpired hits her with the force of a four story fall.

 

She curls into her white sheets and repeats the words again and again. _Thank you._ To whom, she doesn’t know. The random string of events, the improbability of such coincidence, the office clerk who matched her details to John and Mary; to them, and their impossible bravery, to herself, for not mustering the courage to open her carotid and end it all.

 

She clutches the book to her chest. A burst of pleasure hits her, thinking of the glint in Mary’s eye when she’d pulled it from the shelf.

 

Sun Tzu. _The Art of War._

 

. . .

 

**Month three**

 

Several times a week, she goes to the market stalls with another Handmaid. Sometimes with Ofdavid, who still has baby fat in her cheeks. Other times, she accompanies Ofeustace, who is grim and never smiles.

 

They walk along the high street. For the first time in weeks, months, _years,_ Molly feels a sense of purpose. Nothing of the streets, the gray brick, the concrete walls snaking north along the park and south toward the river have changed, but on this day, with her new, clear, hopeful eyes, colors seems brighter, the air, clearer. She will not only see, but _observe_.

 

He always used to say people didn’t do that enough.  

 

Austerity measures are commonplace, but she catches sight of Ofcharles at the butcher. There always seem to be larger portions for her.

 

There are bodies on the wall today. Some have scarlet red _W_ s are slashed across their bare torsos. Some women are headless. She wonders about their crimes.

 

. . .

 

_Appear weak when you are strong, and strong when you are weak._

 

 _Yes,_ she thinks. Exactly.

 

. . .

 

A day later, she approaches the study, intent to once more offer her thanks.

 

She hears John speaking. He’s irritated. Annoyed. “I don’t care what you’ve been working on for the last few weeks.”

 

“Not really my area, _Captain._ ”

 

The book hits the floor with a shocking thud. Blood pounds in her ears.

 

She knows that voice.

 

Footsteps, then the echoing swing of the door being pulled open. John blinks, taking in her still out-stretched hands, her open mouth.  

 

“Can I…” John starts to say.

 

But she is not looking at him. She is looking over his shoulder at a man she’s not seen in years. Their eyes meet. He stands up straight, drinking in everything about her.

 

She breathes a breath of shock that is also pain and relief, too. Words vanish. An auspicious name and a face she’s never forgotten. _Sherlock._ Here.

 

_How–?_

 

They push forward, drawn like magnets. In the same moment, a step apart, they pause, unable to breach that final distance. They stare, struck dumb.  

 

“You’re...not dead,” Sherlock Holmes says, eventually.  

 

“You too,” she breathes. Shock dissipates. Idiot. “I mean—Sorry. I just...I never thought I’d see you again. I never thought I’d see _anyone_ from Barts again.”

 

“You know–?” John looks between them, dubious. “You know each other?”

 

“The university,” Sherlock says, not looking at him. His eyes glance over her: the headwrap, the dress, her shaking hands. His hands hover over the fabric, not touching, frozen. “ _Mycroft,_ ” he seethes. He stalks to the window.

 

“You think your brother was involved?”

 

“Of course he was involved. He’s always _involved_ .” Sherlock shakes his head, bitter. “All the king’s captains, and all the king’s men...and out of the blue you’re assigned a– ” He bites the words out with resentment, “ _Handmaid._ ”

 

“We assumed it was a test. Magnussen.”

 

“Oh, it’s a test. Of what, I’m not certain.” He looks suddenly at John, expression dark.

 

John holds out his hands, palms turned up. _Look. I’ve nothing to hide_ , he seems to say.

 

Molly realizes the meaning of the darkness in his expression. “No! He hasn’t,” she says quickly. “If you...um, wondered.”

 

Sherlock looks away from John. He looks down at her, blinks once, twice. “Yes. Obviously, Molly,” he says, and steps away. That arrogance, again. That coldness. But it is not as sharp as it once was.

 

Something bubbles up in her chest. A lightness, a _brightness_ , and good.

 

What was the word for that feeling?   

 

. . .

 

Sherlock is (“ _Teeeeech_ nically...”) an underling to John, under the guise of Will Scottson. Given how supercilious he was to professors and instructors as a mere student, it must _really_ irritate him to play bodyguard and security personnel to his best friend. She is only a tiny bit amused by this.

 

“What happened to you?” she asks. “After.”

 

“An extended stay in a detention facility. Some light ‘persuasive’ techniques. So, beatings and sensory torture. Wasn’t terrible.”

 

That _must_ have been terrible. There’s no way that could not be terrible.

 

“Solitary was the worst.”

 

Oh.

 

“Why did they let you out?”  

 

“My brother has always been in a position of power. He enjoys a great deal of influence. He brokered a deal with the ministers to use me in security. Preventing crimes against the elite, such as they were. My assignment to John and Mary was also, I assure you, not a coincidence. He’s playing a very long game with the Lords of the Realm.” He folds his fingers beneath his hands. “Destabilizing them slowly, sowing seeds of doubt and distrust among their ranks.”

 

Her head spins. So much information, so much _scheming,_ after so long without. “In the midst of chaos, there is also opportunity,” she quotes.

 

He looks at her, surprised. “Indeed.”

 

“Why?”

 

“The more rancor there is amongst Magnussen and his ilk, the less reliance they will place—”

 

“No, not that,” she interrupts. “I mean, why did you join? Why not just leave?”

 

His eyes take in her dress. The red wrap around her hair. The hands folded demurely in her lap. He looks away. “Because obviously they need to be stopped.”

 

. . .

 

**Month four**

 

Janine is married to a high commander named Wilkes, but has the tendency to let slip after several drinks that she is been privy to information from Magnussen. Among other things.  

 

“Still?” she says, staring pointedly at Molly’s abdomen. “Honestly, Mary. I warned you to make her take better care. But perhaps it’s for the best. Charles is very accommodating. If he sees things haven’t worked out after six months, he’ll make a change for you–” Janine snaps her fingers, “–straight off. Sebastian is so grateful for the way in which he rewards loyalty.”

 

Mary’s fork clatters against the china. “Oop! Silly cow.”   

 

“Ofjohn? Another!” Janine instructs. “By the way, tell me about your husband’s man.”

 

Janine’s words ring in her ear.

 

 _Make a change_.

 

 _Make a change_.

 

It’s a punch. A bright, angry slap of fear. She’s overcome, so bowled over by the idea of it that she barely hears Janine’s segue.

 

After the miraculous stroke of luck, the benevolent goodwill of some unseen _deus ex machina,_ the old fears are once again very real, and all the more terrifying.

 

When Mary smiles uncommonly brightly as she pushes through the door with a tea-tray of lemon cakes and chocolates, the fear grows fresh in her belly.

 

. . .

 

She listens at the door that night.

 

A voice: “They will. You _know_ they will.”

 

“Not yet.”

 

“Soon, though! Janine is thick, but she’s not a moron. Moreover, she knows Magnussen’s behavior. The customs and ‘favors’ he does.”

 

A pause. Mary sighs. “And as soon as they know I’m pregnant, Molly is _gone._ Shipped off to another officer. Or worse.”

 

“I’ll go to Mycroft.”

 

“There’s no guarantee.”

 

“So what? We get her out?”

 

“We can try. Or stage something. Steal the car, make a run for Cambridge gate. They can get through, get outside the cordons, with messages for Smallwood…But we’d lose a resource in here to do that.”

 

“That’ll raise even more suspicion than we’re currently under. And hold up Smallwood, bit by bit.”

 

He sighs. The floorboards creak. “There is another way. If you, I mean, if you were to...Goddammit!” Something solid – his fist? – _bangs_ loudly on a table.

 

Sherlock breaks into the conversation suddenly. “Say what you mean, John.”

 

“No. No. John!” Mary scoffs. “What’s wrong with you? _Absolutely_ not. _”_

 

“They’re Handmaids. You know–” A sigh, “–what their purpose is. I hate everything about this. I mean— _I hate it._ I hate it so much, I’m risking my life, my wife’s, _my unborn child_ to bring down this perversion of a government. But I can’t do that in Scotland. I can’t do that in Belgium, or from America. This doesn’t work if we don’t act the part. Right? So we need to be here, inside. Get information back to Smallwood _._ ”

 

“Yes.”

 

“So.”

 

“I’m so sorry, Sherlock,” John says, dejected. “We need _you_.”

 

Understanding hits like a blow to the chest.  

 

. . .

 

More bodies on the wall. One, two, three. Men. Doctors, by their lab coats. Or scientists, possibly. Classmates? Tutors? Professors?

 

More soldiers in the streets.

 

Janine has new shoes.

 

Ofeustace is pregnant, now. She has done her task well. She looks more unhappy than Molly has ever seen her. 

 

She makes the observations wherever she can. Reads Sun Tzu. _He who wishes to fight must first count the cost._

 

From the doorway to the white room, Mary says her name.

 

. . .

 

A knock.

 

Her eyes are red-rimmed and puffy. She sniffs from her place on the floor, as far from the bed as possible. “Come in.”

 

“I…” Sherlock looks at a loss. Though, to be fair, there wasn’t really an easy way to break the ice.

 

_Hi, hello, I’m here because I’ve been tasked to impregnate you, thereby prolonging the Watsons’ charade in their mission to destroy our heretical psycho-religious overlords, which also has the added benefit of keeping you under this roof and probably saving your life. Foreplay?_

 

He sits beside her. “I realize this is not something you desire.”

 

She clutches her legs to her at the ankle. With one nail, she worries at the polished hardwood floorboards. If she looked closely, she could make out the tree rings in the grain. A line for every year. Like a scar, but not a scar. Evidence of life. 

 

“Or you,” Molly says.  

 

So unfair. It is so _supremely_ unfair.

 

She sniffles. “Have you? Ever?”

 

He shakes his head. “Told them I was waiting for marriage.”

 

She wants to laugh at that. A weak smile is the best she can muster.

 

They sit side by side on the floor against the wall. His hands rest on his knees. She wraps her arms tighter around her legs, pulling her feet back against her bum beneath the ridiculous nightgown. It’s tied off at the neck and wrists, like a Victorian child’s doll.

 

“William Sherlock Scott Holmes.”

 

Molly looks up. “What?”

 

“My name,” he explains, with a roll of his eyes. “The whole of it. If we have to…” He gestures vaguely with one hand, “...do _this,_ I thought you should probably know that. I dunno why. Just...should, I suppose.”

 

“Oh.”

 

“Tell me yours.”

 

She sighs. “Sherlock, you _know_ my name.”

 

“Do you? Still?”

 

A tear slips out. “Of course. I remember so much.”

 

She remembers the sparkling glassware in her lab. The rattle of the London Underground. The weight of a two pound coin in her pocket. The taste of illicit, smuggled-in wine on her tongue. She remembers a bathing suit, and running shorts. She remembers books and courses. Walking to the shops on her own, to buy things she only _wanted_ . She remembers men who were her friends, when friends they could be, and nothing more. Nothing of the enemy. Women who were respected and held positions in the world. She remembers her _life_ before she was a body.

 

She’s a pool of memory in the shape of a woman, and it pours out of her now, here, with the last person to know _Molly, before._

 

“I can’t, Sherlock…” Her voice cracks. “I can’t.”

 

He nods. “I know.”

 

They stay there on the floor. She should send him back, shortly. Ask him not to speak to John and Mary. But she is unable to bring herself to move. Unwilling. That is the word. They are both unwilling.

 

“I was going to be a doctor.” She speaks not to make conversation, but so someone will hear it and know her choices for what they had been. Know the _person_ she had been.  

 

Atoms shiver. Molecules form. Possibilities spiral. Infinite. Endless.

 

“I was going to be a detective,” Sherlock answers.

 

. . .

 

When Molly wakes, it is in her bed, surrounded by white, which is not unusual. She must have fallen asleep against his shoulder there on the floor.

 

“Sleep, Molly Hooper,” says a voice beside her head, which decidedly is.  

 

But she is so very tired, and so warm in the cold white room, and so she does.

 

. . .

 

They don’t, but he does come to her room after that, on occasion. An open secret. He slides into her bed in the small hours, after discussions and plans and games are played.

 

A presence close enough to touch.

 

A warmth close enough to feel.

 

He is never there in the morning.

 

. . .

 

“Do you ever think about it?” she asks one night, into the darkness. “Barts? London? How it was?”

 

“No.”

 

“What do you think about?”

 

“Slaying dragons,” he says. His voice is above, and below, and radiates through her. A timbre like a shockwave. “Destroying the world.”

 

In spite of the costs, the rising pressure, her growing fears, they don’t do anything more than sleep. He does touch her though, sometimes, gently. Subtle. It’s enough, in the moments when his skin slides against hers, to spark the old flame of desire. The Sisters used to use pretty, delicate-sounding words for her at the reeducation centre. Phrases like _Yet Untouched_ and _Perfect Purity_ , but she’s felt the lovely burn of desire. Has felt lust. Once, she thought it might have been love. But by then, so much was ending, there wasn’t time to think about it. And then Sherlock had disappeared and she was sent to the centre, so it hadn’t mattered.

 

Now that he’s here, though, it would be so easy to climb across his body in the night, and ignite. She cannot afford the cost.

 

There is more to it, though. More than just the consequences she would bear. What holds her back is the idea that, when he reaches for her, he’s reaching out for a piece of the past. Nothing more. Someone who knew him when he was brilliant and well-off enough to make his own choices. Before he was playing a part, month after month, year on year, so long that maybe he’d become something else by now. So long, he could never return to that previous life. That’s all she is to him. Nothing more.

 

But it is nice, not being alone.

 

. . .

 

**Month five**

 

They are walking in the market, a pair in red, like cherries on a branch, when Molly looks around, realizes. “There are more soldiers, aren’t there?”

 

Around them on corners and in groups, the Guardians gather. Earpieces glint in the morning sun. Their documents are checked four, five times.

 

“They’re worried,” Ofcharles whispers, not looking at her. “I overheard the other night. They believe there’s a spy. Someone high up.”

 

She tells John and Mary in the study, who look at one another with concern, but with expressions that reveal nothing.  

 

. . .

 

John finds her in the kitchen. “Office. Now.”

 

“What’s going on?” she says, behind the safety of doors and walls.  

 

“Need your assistance,” Sherlock offers, rummaging through a bag.  

 

“What is it—What _is_ that?”

 

“Disguise. Yours.” He holds up a short black dress with diamante straps and missing side panels. _Very_ short. Years before it would have been sexy and risque. Now, it is downright shocking.

 

She frowns. “That’s not a disguise.”

 

“Sure it is.”

 

“That’s the _opposite_ of a disguise.” He can’t be serious. “It’s not even proper clothing,” Molly objects. “I’ll be arrested in that.”

 

“Not where we’re going.”

 

“Where are we going?”

 

“ _Out_. Now change. Quickly. ” He turns around.

 

She pulls on the short black dress, feeling more naked with clothes than she does alone in the bath.

 

“The Diogenes Club is a gentlemen’s society and lounge. John’s taking you in. A lot of them do this sort of thing. Tawdry. Tacky. Hypocrisy at its dullest.”

 

She pulls on the heels. They fit her in an odd, imperfect way, feeling unfamiliar, but also not odd, and somewhat familiar. Cognitive dissonance.

 

“One of the informants sent a message. She has information for us.”  

 

“Why do I need to be there? Why can’t Mary–?”

 

“Wives aren’t allowed. They like power, and they like flaunting it most of all. Even in disguise it would be a risk we can’t afford. You’ll do.”

 

He turns to undo the wrap on her head, loosen the braids into long waves. “Besides, don’t you get so _bored?”_

 

. . .

 

The car slides through streets she has never seen. These are places she would never, in any other circumstance, be able to go.

 

_Foreknowledge cannot be gotten from ghosts and spirits, cannot be had by analogy, cannot be found out by calculation. It must be obtained from people, people who know the conditions of the enemy._

 

. . .

 

She has never felt more out of place. They lead her inside. John clings to her like a drunk. A ruse. Sherlock slips away. He wears a fake beard and absurd glasses, hunches, as though he’s older than he appears. Not himself. It is unsettling, watching him shapeshift, but also oddly fascinating.

 

Leafy palms drape over dark leather wingback armchairs. Figures writhe upon them. Men, women. Men and men. More women and women, surrounded by onlookers. She flushes.

 

“There’s an informant. She sent word she has information to share.”

 

Mirrors line the walls. She catches sight of her own. The makeup is cheap. Unflattering, but without it she’d be even more out of place than she currently is. A cocktail of clear liquid smells of oranges and strong alcohol. She sips it, grimacing.

 

Suddenly, in the mirror, so across the room, another face. A face she knows.

 

Her heart stops. _Sally!_

 

She wills Sally to look at her. _See her_ . She could say thank you. Tell her. Tell her! The Resistance exists, lives, _is doing something._

 

Sally totters on high heels. A man with silver hair approaches her, pulls her to him aggressively. She hesitates in a door, but John tugs her along.

 

Sally’s eyes find hers. She tips her head. Sips her drink. Remains composed.

 

“The loo,” John whispers. “In five minutes, I’ll go to the loo. You’ll wait here. She’ll find you.”

 

“Who?”

 

He looks about. “They’re known, collectively, as The Women, here. But she, _she_  is unquestionably, The Woman. She’ll ask you a question. Your answer will be, ‘Vatican Cameos.’”

 

“What’s the question?”

 

“I’ve no idea.”

 

The pretend caresses are awkward and strange. Her shoulders hunch together. She wants to crawl inside herself and hide, like a crab into its shell.

 

A dark-haired woman approaches. She has a mouth like a crimson wound. Alluring, distracting, amazing. “Hello, there, my sweet,” she says, trailing a finger up Molly’s arm. Tugs gently on one of her awful glittery earrings. “Aren’t you a shiny little thing. Would you like to...misbehave?”

 

Is that a question? “Vatican Cameos,” she says, softly.   

 

The Woman is very beautiful. She crawls into Molly’s lap. She leans in and whispers in Molly’s ear. “Drive. In my pants. Get it out. Take your time, luv. I’m in noooo–” She bites Molly’s earlobe gently, “–rush.”  

 

Then she kisses Molly. _Deeply._

 

She feigns the passion, fumbling a bit because this woman really _is_ a good kisser, and even if women aren’t her sexual preference, oh, it’s been so long. The endorphin rush from the slide of soft, warm hands on her face and breasts, in her hair, gripping her body. Touching everywhere. It leaves her reeling and panting for air by the time they disentangle. With a small hard drive clutched in her palm.

 

The Woman pops a tiny little kiss on her nose. “Well done,” she purrs, and winks.

 

She traces little circles between Molly’s legs, mouth hovering above her lips. “For your trouble?”

 

 _Oh!_ Under The Woman’s touch, slow, shallow waves feed a growing swell of desire. Touch is so many things. A stimulus and a balm; a thrill, a comfort. She wonders what it would be like with her, a woman, whose body has been commodified like hers. A transactional space, controlled and used by others.  

 

She pushes The Woman’s wrist away. “N-no. Thank you? I don’t want them to see...that.”

 

“Understood. Privacy is a gift.” Her expression shifts. The strength beneath the facade appears. In the low light, her beauty is just as vivid, but the bones of her face, the press of her nails, take on a sharper, harder quality. She looks fragile, and tired. “Don’t let the bastards get you down,” she implores. The Woman slinks away into a crowd across the room. There are catcalls and low whistles. Heart beating in overdrive, Molly feels the loss.

 

John hasn’t returned. Across the room, she sees Sherlock still, watching her. She looks deliberately toward the loos, trying to communicate her intention. Then she stands, as confidently as she can, and slips inside. The drive she tucks into her bar, in the loose fabric below her right breast. 

 

A minute later. Sally pushes through the door, locking it behind her.

 

“What in the hell are you doing here?” Sally whispers, agog. “What happened?”

 

“It’s okay. I’m okay.” Molly pulls her into a tight hug and whispers very quietly, “It’s Mayday. I’m with them.”

 

“Good girl. Fuck them all.”

 

Her pupils, Molly realizes, are blown wide. Her pallor is ashy, with dark purple circles under her eyes hidden inexpertly.

 

“Are you high?” Molly asks, touching Sally’s wrist.

 

“As a kite!” Sally laughs, bright, hysterical. “Every night. It’s not as fun for us.”

 

Molly’s throat aches. She squeezes her hand.

 

Someone bangs on the bathroom door.

 

“I gotta go. I’m glad she got you the stuff,” Sally whispers. “Make them _burn._ ” She unlocks the door. Molly musses her hair, attempts to look sultry and dazed when she follows.

 

In the hall, Sally touches her hand once, and is gone. She disappears down a dark alcove. A group of men in suits watch as she goes. Then they follow.

 

A hand grabs her by the wrist. She gasps, pulling back. Sherlock tightens his grip. “Was that really necessary?”

 

Her head is thick from the alcohol. Her pulse is racing. “Depends, I guess.”

 

“We’ve got to make it upstairs. Avoid making yourself a spectacle along the way.”

 

Around them are more illicit, more furious couplings. In fact, Molly thinks, if anyone looks out of place it’s them as they are now. Touching, but only just.  

 

. . .

 

John leads her down shadowy stairs, through a different set of rooms. Strange light shines from rooms above. It feels like a dungeon.

 

Feral sounds shatter through thumping music behind closed doors.

 

He leads her into one. The room is filled with long sofas, and a long central ottoman. Low music thumps from speakers in the corner. Across the room is a tall man whose face she’s seen before. The door shuts. John pulls out some sort of communications device. Taps the screen. “And, okay. We’re up. That’ll scramble any recording device in here for the next hour.”

 

“You’ve got it?” the man asks. Looking to her.

 

She fishes in her bra, removes the little drive. Holds it out. “You might, um, want to wash that.”

 

He gives her a look of distaste, uses his handkerchief to retrieve it. Plus it into a tablet.

 

For a time they review the contents. Reading, commenting on numbers and plans and codes that are meaningless to her. Molly sits on the arm of a sofa, lost and feeling awkward in her skimpy dress.

 

“Good. Get it to your network. Get it to Smallwood. I shall send a second false copy through the contacts they’re aware of.”

 

“I don’t understand what we are here for,” she says to Sherlock. “Why couldn’t he have gotten it from that woman?”

 

“Part of the cover.”

 

“I cannot be seen to...mingle with the usual sorts, up there. It would be unheard of,” the tall man explains. “There’s a custom of... _sharing_ , so to speak, among the men in the upper echelons of our circle. It would not be the first time a young woman was smuggled in here. Just as it will likely not be the last. For now.”

 

She gives him a look of repulsion, which he returns.

 

“Don’t mind my brother,” Sherlock drawls. “He shares a distaste for any kind of _human_ behavior, regardless how twisted or benign.”

 

“Your brother,” Molly repeats, looking at the tall man.   

 

“We have spent a suitable amount of time here,” says Mycroft Holmes. “You should go. Now. It’s a quieter evening than usual. Do not prolong the risk.”

 

Sherlock takes the data stick. John removes his coat, rumples his shirt, half untucks it.

 

“Wait,” Molly says.

 

“Yes?” Mycroft Holmes studies her with a weather eye.

 

She looks at Sherlock’s brother. “I’ve seen you. On telly. In pictures. With him, Magnussen. People in government.”

 

She can tell he’s waiting for her to arrive at a point. Any point at all.

 

“I know why they’re in it,” she says, glancing to Sherlock and John. “But you’re up there. At the top, where everything is nice and easy and good. Why would you want to tear that down?”

 

“This is a war, I’m afraid. A war we must lose. History will forgive nothing less.”

 

“You assigned me to them. Sherlock’s friends. Why?”

 

“You saved my brother’s life, once. I assure you, Doctor Hooper, it was the _very least_ I could do.”

 

“We’re leaving,” Sherlock says.

 

She follows him, but at the door, looks back. “I’m not a doctor, you know. Not really. I never qualified.”

 

Briefly, Mycroft meets her eye before he returns to his papers. “You would have.”

 

. . .

 

Sherlock guides the car into the garage behind 223. His disguise is gone. He looks the part of a security officer Scottson again. John ducks out once they’ve stopped, nods to them both, muttering a well done, and heads inside to update Mary in private. He is anxious being away from Mary these days.

 

“Thank you. For your assistance,” Sherlock says to her.  

 

“My pleasure.”

 

“No. Really.”

 

“I don’t mean pleasure...And I can’t say it was a very _nice_ time. But I’m glad I could help. That I could do something, for once. So much of this is just waiting and thinking.”

 

“I know. You’re very loud about it.”

 

Her mouth drops. Then without being able to stop herself, she laughs. Truly. For the first time in ages. Years. He smiles.

 

He bends his head to hers, reaching for her cheek. As he did, the breath he exhales passes over her lips. For an instant, they share the same air, a collection of the same particles that moves from him into her. The cool rush gusts over her lips and tongue, into her throat, down her lungs. A sensation there and gone in a moment, in less than a moment, but she is hyper-aware of each millisecond. He touches the edge of her cheek. Molly gasps at the contact of his lips on her skin. Warm, dry, soft. He hesitates as he pulls back, lingering there, his mouth at her jaw. For an endless moment his mouth drags lower, along her jaw where he could, if he wanted, he could just, _oh_ …

 

She swallows heavily when he pulls back. His eyes flicker to her face. She can see his pupils dilated. He steps out of the car.

 

A beautiful spy had kissed and groped her lustily not hours before, in a room full of people using each other for all manner of sexual acts, games, and schemes.

 

It seemed odd, and equally absurd how, then, a brush of lips across her cheek could be the single most erotic moment of her life.

 

That night, she lays in bed, remembering the feel of The Woman’s hands on her.

 

Sherlock doesn’t come to her room that night.

 

Molly suspects she knows why.

 

. . .

 

Her secrets give her a new perspective. When she steps out on errands with Ofcharles and the others, she feels like she is burning with potential. It is not so dangerous a game as John and Mary are playing, with their child and their loyalties. But it is dangerous, nonetheless.

 

They all have a great deal to lose.

 

. . .

 

Molly starts awake from her dream, where she was surrounded by trees and fields of bone-white snow. Alone.

 

She comes back to herself slowly. There is pressure on her thigh. She turns, realizing. And curious. She pushes back the sheets. On his back now, against white sheets, it is almost like an examination room.

 

The cool air and her movements pull him from sleep. A light sleeper, she’s learned. Realizing his situation, her open scrutiny, he shifts away to leave. He is embarrassed. “Apologies—”

 

“No,” she says, hand at his shoulder. “I want to.”

 

She cups the bulge, gently, then reaches into his pants, pulls the elastic down a little. He’s hot to the touch, and the skin is soft, so very soft. Fascinating. So different from the clinical descriptions in her texts. She wraps her hand around him, grips the base of his cock, gently. Then steadily.

 

His breathing becomes labored.

 

He grows more rigid as she moves. Her fingers cannot quite wrap the whole way around once he is fully erect. She’s warm, flushed, but focused. Centered in her task. Sherlock lets out a small sigh. Greater than the desire is the _power_ she feels. She speeds up slightly. With her other hand, she lightly brushes the sparse hairs on his sac, his thighs, his abdomen.

 

He groans through his teeth. Delight surges through her. Experimentally, she holds out her tongue, runs a little stripe along his flesh. Interesting. Musky salt, and heat. She licks the head, and lets him thrust up into her mouth a little. Shallow at first, then deeper. “Fuck,” he gasps.  

 

She places a hand on his chest, as if holding him down. She’s kneeling beside him, and it’s an odd, sort of difficult rhythm, her hand becomes a bit sore. But he doesn’t last much longer.

 

With his head thrown back, breathless and utterly undone, she cannot help but think: _This is power. Why. This is why they fear us. This power we have._

 

She runs a tissue over his pale stomach. Licks one pale bead of semen from his abdomen. “Interesting,” she says, more to herself, than him.  

 

Sherlock says nothing, but pulls her to his bare chest, and winds his fingers into her hair.

 

She presses against his booming, juddering heart, feeling capable. Feeling potent.

 

. . .

 

“We’re having a party this coming weekend,” Mary tells her. “Some of the other Captains. Officers. There will be more to do than usual.”

 

Molly nods. “Of course.”

 

“There will be some very important people here. I need you to stay out of sight. In the kitchens, or else upstairs. We want to limit your exposure as much as we can. Obviously you have to keep up appearances in the markets and whatnot, but I don’t want to get sloppy.”

 

“Absolutely.” It isn’t much of a hardship, playing the mute role she has for so long. She lingers out of sight, listening to the voices chattering below. The tinkle of glass, the rising of laughter. What must their world be like. What memories do _they_ remember?  

 

Molly worries the edge of her book, feeling weary of Sun Tzu. Tonight she’d prefer an escape. He’d not approve.

 

She steps down from the white room, to the first floor, careful not to make a sound. Cracking the door, she flicks on the light to John’s study.

 

Sherlock is sitting in the red armchair.

 

“Sh–” she starts to say. Then realizes he is not alone. Janine kneels on the floor before him, her hand reaching into his pants. Her face is bright with lust, and her lipstick utterly smudged.

 

“Oh!”

 

A tense, terrible, _endless_ moment where she can’t move, can’t breathe, can’t stutter out a sound. Flickers of emotion cross Sherlock’s face but land on anger.   

 

“Well? _Get out!_ ” Janine hisses.

 

Molly turns and flees.  

 

 _“Godfucking dammit_ ,” she hears.

 

She shuts the door of her room. Face burning. She feels so stupid. So, _foolish._ Of course.

 

She sits there, paralyzed by position, and emotion. Like a masochist, she plays the scene out over, and over…

 

Feet thunder on the steps. Her door flies open. Sherlock is furious.

 

“What the _hell_ did you think you were doing?”

 

“What?”

 

“I believe you were told to confine yourself here.”

 

“I was told to remain _out of sight_. Which I did. I am not a prisoner in this house.”

 

“You are _only_ a prisoner in this house! That’s the _point_!”  

 

“Sorry to interrupt your _liaison_. Need I remind you, that room is supposed to be a place of _confidence._ Trust!”

 

He glances at the door. Takes her arm, gripping it hard. “It was part of a plan,” he hisses, quiet. He’s truly angry.

 

“Of course,” she spits. She refuses to look at him.   

 

“A plan I’ve been working on for weeks. Which you _ruined.”_

 

“How perfectly horrible of me,” she says, dry.  

 

“ _Mary_ was supposed to interrupt. Catch her ‘dear friend’ Janine in the act so we could use it as leverage against her to give up some new information on Magnussen. She wasn’t–I was going to _let_ her–” He seems irritable at his loss of words. He huffs a sigh of irritation and leaves, slamming the door.

 

She steams with anger. She burns with self-recrimination.

 

 _“We cannot enter into alliances,”_ Sun Tzu reminds her, _“until we are acquainted with the designs of our neighbors.”_

 

In the morning, she approaches Mary.  

 

“I didn’t mean to–” Anger closes in. And guilt, too. There is a larger purpose. “–interfere.”

 

Mary looks at her, severe. “You were warned for a reason. I have no desire to _actually_ inhibit your freedoms–” At this, Molly snorts, “–so please do not ignore directions again. I mean it.”

 

“Fine.”

 

“Fine.”

 

Two days later, in the Marylebone market, she catches a glimpse of Janine, who looks pale and drawn.

 

It seems as though Mary has been able to salvage their planning after all.

 

. . .

 

In the park, near the bandstand, bodies hang from the Wall.

 

She looks, compelled, as always, out of  the same grim curiosity that has always guided her to do so. A habit she loathes as much as she craves the opportunity to do so. She never expects to see anyone. Today there are three. A man she does not recognize, and two women. Beaten, but still identifiable.

 

She drops her basket. Apples scatter to the pavement.

 

The Woman.

 

Sally.

 

Who saw? And how did they know?

 

Ofdavid sees her shock. “Familiar?” she asks, fearful.

 

She swallows. “I...went to a centre with one of them. She ran away…I thought she made it out.”

 

Ofdavid nods. “Come on,” she says, gently. She collects her apples, and tugs Molly’s dress. “There is nothing you can do for them. Nothing at all.”

 

She turns them to go. Across the lawn opposite, a crowd has gathered. An announcer is speaking words into a microphone. They approach, tentative.

 

“–crimes against the Realm, including conspiring to commit treason, Captain Wilkes shall be put to death.”

 

Sebastian Wilkes is bound at the wrists. Dazed. He appears drugged. His brows screw up in worry. “I didn’t,” he protests, confused. “I didn’t.”

 

“Liar!” Janine shouts. “You are _liars!”_ Molly feels a pang of grief and empathy for this woman who is exactly that—just a woman. A woman, and a pawn, and as powerless as she is.

 

A stone is thrown. Then another. Then a rain of them fall. Between the surrounding bodies, the masses of people Molly can make out the battered, bloody form of Sebastian Wilkes.

 

A stone strikes above his eye. She cannot hear the sound it makes. He blinks, and collapses.

 

Janine screams and _screams._  

 

Molly closes her eyes, and turns away.

 

. . .

 

Ofcharles tugs her through the streets, the crowds. _Soo Lin. Meena. Sally._ What was her name, once? Stella? Robin? Tessa? Ofcharles blinks nervously as they come to her door. The high steps, the ornate, white facade. “Will you be able to get home alright?”

 

Molly is about to answer when a car slows to a crawl beside them. They turn to see the door crack, open. “What fortunate timing.”  

 

She and Ofcharles both freeze, pale mirrors of one another.

 

Charles Augustus Magnussen steps from his vehicle. “Take these away.” He gestures to the baskets in Ofcharles’ hands. Not once does he glance in his Handmaid's direction.

 

Ofcharles glances at her once, lowers her eyes, leaves them. 

 

Magnussen's gaze is at once open and dispassionate in its scrutiny. “Did you enjoy it?”

 

She finds a word. “What?”

 

“The execution. Dear, oh dear. Mr. Wilkes _was_ a bad boy. His due came, though,” he says, as if it were self evident.

 

She does not answer. Magnussen walks a circle around her.

 

“Do you know why executions are public? Why we hold them in open spaces for any and all to observe? Take part, occasionally, when the situation and severity calls for it?”

 

“Why?” She lets her voice and gaze be her weapons. What else does she have? Nothing.

 

“Because justice can also be theater. And theater is catharsis.” He glances up, considers his large home, his position. He looks back to her. “You are of Captain Watson, correct?”

 

She nods. “Yes.”

 

“I like him. I like his pretty wife. How long, now?”

 

“Five months.”

 

“And still nothing?”

 

“No, sir. But,” She forces her voice to be small. _Pretend to be weak, that he may grow arrogant._ “I remain hopeful.”

 

He takes hold of her hands. Turns them up, over. He draws a line indecently far along her forearm with one pale fingertip. She must pull her hands back, as if burned.

 

“Pity,” Charles Augustus Magnussen says. “My own Handmaid has also not been rewarded. Perhaps our next rotations will each be more–” He wipes his hands with a handkerchief, “–successful.”

 

Her skin _crawls._

 

“I like your kind. Such lovely little angels. You make the funniest faces.” His smile is a perversion. “Yum yum,” he says. Winks. Leaves her.

 

She suppresses the desire to run for one entire block and counts it a small victory over instinct. She feels filthy. She feels disgusted.

 

Somewhere a clock is ticking. Her time is almost up.

 

. . .

 

Molly bolts through the front door of 221. She drops her basket, running up the stairs as fast as her skirts allow.

 

Sherlock is in the study, poring over a datafile. She slams the door behind her. His brows crinkle in confusion at her state. “What’s happened?” He is on his feet.

 

“They killed them. That Woman. From the place you took us. And my friend. Sally. She didn’t do anything. I spoke to her, but she didn’t do _anything_.”

 

She’s shaking her head, shaking all over. The mob. The bodies. A rock against Wilkes’ skull.

  

“Fuck,” he curses. “They know about their involvement. Which means they must suspect John. Were there any others?”

 

She shakes her head. “Not on the Wall. But they killed Janine’s husband. Sebastian Wilkes?” Does he know him? “By mob. No guns. Nothing fast.” She lets out a shaky breath. “They said treason.”

 

His gaze flits away, into the puzzle-piecing expression he wore so often in their lab, before. “So they suspect his involvement? No. A smokescreen. A distraction, to placate the actual spies they are still attempting to snuff out. Make us think we’re safe. Wilkes is an idiot. No one would be believe him capable of being a spy.”

 

“Wouldn’t that be a _good_ cover? Pretending to be so inept?”

 

He considers this. “Point. Killed him just to be safe, then. But they’ll be worried. Distracted.” He takes a deep breath. “It’s almost time, then.” He taps something into his datapad.

 

The waning pink-orange light of a spring afternoon slips in beneath the curtains, but the warmth of it has already gone. “Magnussen spoke to me.”

 

“What?” Sherlock looks up. “What did he say?”

 

Molly recounts the conversation. His touches. His implications. Her heart pounds at the memory of Magnussen invading her space. His reptilian presence. She feels her worth in his stare. Or rather, her worthlessness. “I mean nothing. Or, only part of me does. I mean so little, and they’re going to kill me.”

 

She looks up at him. “Sherlock,” she manages. “They’re going to kill me. Tomorrow, or the next, or when I’ve been _used_. It’s over.”

 

He swallows. Holds her by the shoulders. “That is what they _do_.”

 

She steps into his arms. “This has to stop.”

 

His voice, so deep, it’s almost her own. “Yes.”

 

A shift in expressions. A change in breathing. His eyes tip down. The tension in his arms changes. He reaches up. To touch her face, she thinks, is surprised when he does not. 

 

His fingers slip beneath the edge of her red headwrap, pulling it back. Her hair spills out over her shoulder, defiant in its disorder. He tosses the piece of fabric aside. 

 

She kisses him. 

 

. . .

 

“I used to lie awake at night, in that room at the centre, and here,” she tells him later, when the they are skin to skin, looking up into the starless cloud cover beyond her skylight. “I’d imagine all the ways I could to kill myself. I knew a day would come where I might have to. I found a knife in the kitchen once. Took it. Hid it. Had my chance to end things on my own terms.”  

 

She frowns into the darkness. His arm comes under hers, wraps around her shoulder, against the sheets. His breath ghosts against her earlobe. “I’ve spent so much time thinking about it. Ever since the moment they handed me that red dress.”

 

“And yet you didn’t.”

 

“No.” She turns over, pressing her bare chest to his. Unbound, the curtain of brown hair falls over her shoulder, like a veil, hiding them from the world. “I just want to live.”

 

. . .

 

Again, later, in the white sheets of her white room. White for purity.

 

The next night, against the workbench in the garage.

 

She likes him behind her, his arms around her front, touching her everywhere and holding her close. When she can feel his breath in her ear and if she turns her head, there, like that, she can see him fully, those eyes, that face, and presses her lips to that beautiful, ruinous mouth. She likes the physicality of it, the press and heat and vital primalness of it. It’s unevolved. It’s instinct. He prefers to be face to face, she thinks. Where he can see and catalogue her expressions.  

 

Another, late, in his little room at the back of the house, in a space filled with electronic detritus—encrypted phones, computer tablets—black clothing, guns. His forehead against hers, no space between them, none at all, and their movements in perfect synchrony, now.

 

“I love you.” She might never say it again.

 

His eyes burn hers.

 

“I love you.” She may be dead tomorrow. Or him.

 

He moves harder, and then faster. Desperation driving his hips forward, hers higher.

 

“I love you.” The slick of sweat on his back and it will never be like this again, she knows. Never.

 

He cries out against the crook of her neck. Breath catches in her throat. Hanging in a stolen cry, broken off behind clenched teeth, swallowed and buried under gasps for air.

 

He breathes hard against neck, damp tendrils of hair, and the bony curve of her clavicle. Their heartbeats are slow and even. Sherlock leans over her. Kisses her, sweet. His fingers against the curve of her jaw.

 

He speaks loudest, clearest, without any words at all.

 

. . .

 

The next morning, he leaves with John for Whitehall, as is their custom.

 

Neither of them return.

 

. . .

 

She races to the park grounds, already crowded with people. “No!”

 

The crowd is jostling past to get a glimpse. Execution days are always popular.

 

Between bodies and between the fence, she can make out the back of his head. Beside him another figure who can only be Wiggins. She shoves forward, pushing.

 

“...for your crimes…” the judge is reading.

 

A woman bellows curses in her ear. She slips through, around, between people.

 

A man steps in her way, obscuring her view.  

 

Molly heaves herself against the chainlink fence between the soldiers and the crowd. Metal bites her hands. Presses into her face. She is empty.

 

The shot rings out.

 

At close range, with the kind of high-powered rifle the Guardians use, the bullet would enter his brain at an oblique angle. It would enter the skull through the parietal bone, causing the thin bone to shatter catastrophically. Bone, fragments, along with the bullet, would rupture the blood-brain barrier. Cerebral spinal fluid would flood in where the soft tissue was pierced. Inside the cranial cavity, the bullet would tear through the gray matter of the cortices, severing blood vessels. Depending on the angle, the exit would explode through the maxilla, the sphenoid, the zygomatic bone.

 

All thoughts would cease.

 

All memories would be lost.

 

A second shot rings out.

 

His body falls to the ground.

 

And Sherlock Holmes is dead.

 

. . .

 

She doesn’t remember the walk back through the gardens, along the wall. She doesn’t remember deciding to move. She sees red. Red of her dress and red across her thighs and red stains on her hands. Red like blood. Red like love. Red of skin and life and death at once.

 

The door is open. The main door: _223_.

 

She steps through the entrance, knowing.

 

Sirens.

 

In the dining room.

 

John’s face is a picture of resolve all but gone.

 

Mary face is cracked, broken.

 

Magnussen grins, dead-eyed and empty. “Did you think we didn’t know? That we haven’t been watching the good Captain Watson and his lovely, lying wife? The traitors in our midst? Getting sloppy, Mary. We’ve had you for months.”   

 

He claps, so pleased with himself.

 

“Take them away now,” Magnussen says. “And the mouse.”

 

A man with silver hair and a hard expression cuffs her hands. Puts a gun to her head.

 

“Ofjohn Watson,” another, reedy weasel-faced man declares. “You have been found guilty of crimes against the self, and of the state. You will be escorted to His Majesty’s Prison South Barrule in the Isle of Man.”

 

His colleagues have their guns trained on John and Mary. She’s forced into the back of a white van. A kind she has seen before and knows to fear. “Get in!” the man barks.

 

Her head swims. Shock.

 

Shock, shock, and shock, and no words through it all.

 

The Watsons are being read similar orders. But theirs are not for imprisonment. Theirs are for death.

 

The door closes before she can call out. The vehicle peels away.

 

Her hands tremble.

 

Speed, and sirens. Blood rushing in her hears. The desperate speed of breath.

 

Orders when they stop, a checkpoint, once, twice. There are no lights, no windows in the back.

 

Her white bed in her white room, inverted.

 

She closes her eyes.

 

The van stops.

 

The weasel-faced man opens the door.

 

Blinded.

 

“Alright.” The man with silver hair holds out a hand. “Time to get out.”

 

A final thought: escape. 

 

_It is a matter of life and death, a road either to safety or to ruin._

 

She reaches out, and grasps it.  

 

. . .

 

 _Once upon a time_ , the stories began. The implication was always _not now_ , _but then. When things were not as we know them to be. When life was different._

 

Once.

 

. . .

 

**_Two years later_ **

Scotland

 

She finishes the examination (ninety-one, pneumonia; external analysis only; his family didn’t want a full autopsy done) and returns the body to cold storage.

 

Molly, _after,_  likes pathology. It gives her medical challenges, free of repercussions. She is not responsible for any outcome. There are only variables to identify. Only pieces of an equation of endless, shifting components, whose outcome has already been determined. She’s already been responsible for too much.

 

She’d been interested in it as a student, too, which helps. It comforts her to know that she still has something in common with Molly, _before._  

 

Lestrade comes around sometimes for tea or a chat. He’s so much kinder than she ever imagined, when he put a gun against her head two years before and saved her life. He’s lonely, she knows. Guilty. Restless. He’ll go back, soon. They say London will fall any day now. Though, they’ve said that before. Even a free press is only as good as the information they get. It’s better, but “better” never means everything, for everyone.  

 

They’re all lonely. Their lives have so many holes. Even John and Mary, with their magical little girl. Even them. Maybe especially them.

 

She closes the lights in the exam room. Ackerly’s shift starts in 10 minutes. It’s quiet enough that she has no qualms about taking a few for herself.

 

In the shower, she rinses away the traces of the anise-scented antiseptic soap. She hates anise and almond. It reminds her of too much. Soaps her arms, her legs, her chest, her belly.

 

Without intending to, she thinks of Mary, after they had met beyond Cambridge gate, when her captors told her they were Mayday and she was not about to die. Mary was ill, often, then. They said it was a good sign. The more morning sickness, the greater the chance of carrying to term. Or some such. A Wives tale. Molly waited for the day when she might feel the nausea. She hadn’t. Remorse came. Also relief, as did the warped, imprecise guilt that accompanied it.  

 

She dries her hair. Winds it into a loose braid, letting it fall over her shoulder. Here she diverges from Molly, before. Molly, before, wore high ponytails. Simple, effective. Molly, after, styles her hair in ornate, pretty ways. She can, now. She returns her things to her locker. Swings the door wider to place her things inside. A shadow. She looks up.

 

A face looks at her in the mirror. A face shattered by a bullet, two years before. A face that stops the progression of time.  

 

She has to reach suddenly for the metal behind her to stay upright. He reaches out to grasp her elbows. She turns around, shaking. 

 

He’s wearing a dark blue coat. She stares, unbelieving. “You’re not dead,” she whispers. Her fingers twist in the red button hole. "Not dead?" 

 

A pointed nod, the twitch of his lips. “You too.”

 

She throws her arms around him, burying her face in his neck.

 

. . .

 

Sherlock explains a little. It’s hours later, and she’s pressed up against him, sweat cooling, heartbeats slowing. “I’m sorry. It was part of the plan. I needed to track someone down on the outside. Another spider, like Magnussen, but one whose network we were willing to parley with. But Magnussen had to believe he had won. That he’d found all his rats. I wanted to tell you. But I couldn’t risk you like that. Any of you.” He huffs, annoyed. “Mycroft had you extracted, because we knew the game— _that_ game—was coming to an end.”

 

There’s a delicate bruise on his cheek where John punched him, but there had been relief and real joy in the moment, too.

 

She curls against his shoulder. “Where is Mycroft?”

 

Sherlock’s jaw tightens. “They executed him. Little over a year ago. Outlived his usefulness.”

 

Molly slides her fingers through his hair. Kisses his shoulder. _I’m sorry._

 

His hands skate over her navel. Lower. He traces the curve of her hip, down across her belly.

 

Molly catches his meaning. She shakes her head a little. “No.”

 

Sherlock makes a noncommittal sound, but draws featherlight symbols across her abdomen.  

 

“I’m glad, you know.” She slides over him. Hands alongside his head, she lowers her face to his.

 

He skates the length of her bare back with his fingertips, tracing the dips and hollers of her spine, winds his hands in her hair. “Are you?

 

“Yes. Now,” Molly says. “We can choose. Whatever we desire. Whatever we don’t. That’s all I’ve wanted. All I’ve wanted for such a long time, Sherlock.” She pauses. Her mouth tips up to one side. “Well, that, _and_ to destroy the world,” she amends.  

 

They smile.

 

* * *

  


**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading my angry feminist love story! Bits of other stories are stolen, here and there. A bit of _Children of Men_. A smattering of _1984_ , garnished with the ages old military philosophy of _The Art of War_. And the series is just thrown into one big blender and mashed up with The Handmaid’s Tale. I wanted to find a place for dear old Jim, but he proved a shifty character. I couldn’t quite figure out where he fit, and in the end, just let him lurk in the shadows, bein' all nefarious and whatnot, as he is wont to do. Irene gets the great book canon line, "Don't let the bastards get you down." She earned it.
> 
> As always, comments, thoughts, favorite lines, feedback...basically all manner of constructive criticism are not only welcome, but openly encouraged :)
> 
> HAPPY SHERLOCK DAY, SAID NO ONE :D


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